Chuck Klosterman on the NBA Finals, a Rival League, the Sonics, 'The Rehearsal,' Cooper Flagg, and the Fear of AI

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I have Chuck Kolsterman coming on in a little bit.

We have have been doing podcasts together since i think i had a podcast in 2007 initially i think the first time when i got to know chuck we did a back and forth email exchange i'm going to say in 2004 when i was writing for page two and we did some back and forths in print and then as soon as uh the podcast form as soon as i had my pod which i think started may 2007 uh we started having long long talks on the pod so this one is no different we're going to be talking about um a lot of NBA stuff.

We talk about Nathan Fielder's, the rehearsal, talking about a lot about AI at the end.

Gets a little grim at the end, actually.

But I thought it was a worthy topic.

But anyway, this goes all over the place for the next two hours.

So, that's coming up in a little bit.

Wanted to mention

the rewatchables.

We put up Working Girl yesterday on the Rewatchables feed.

You can watch it as a video podcast as well.

I had a great time.

It was 20 minutes longer than the actual movie, which we usually try to make the episode the same length as the movie.

We couldn't pull it off this time.

Same length or less usually is the rule.

Not this time.

We went for like two hours, 15 minutes.

Me and Minnetta Obvins, Joyne Robinson.

You can watch it on the Ringer Movies YouTube channel as well.

You can watch all of the stuff from this podcast and the Bill Simmons YouTube channel.

And don't forget about Fando's Sportsbook, by the way, because they have

all customer profit boosts coming for every game of the NBA Finals that we're going to have left.

I'm going to try to figure out, I'll tweet out something for this week for, I think, game three.

Trying to come up with something,

something good.

It's probably something in the neighborhood of Indiana with the over and maybe a Siakam rebound thing.

If there's a case for Indiana to win in game three, I think it goes a specific way, and that's probably the bet.

So that's what I'm going to figure out.

We're going to take a break.

We're going to bring in Pearl Jam.

And then.

Chuck Clostrum.

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All right, we're recording.

It is 9:22 Pacific time.

The man, the myth, Chuck Klosterman, is here.

We're going to talk about a whole bunch of stuff.

Haven't talked to you in a while.

It felt like the right time.

A lot of stuff percolating in the air.

How do you gauge the right time?

What does the right time feel like to you?

If I miss talking to you, if I feel like there's a lot of storylines for us to hit,

usually things have to feel weird in some sort of way.

I think sports feels a little weird right now, which I guess we could start with that with the...

With the NBA, a sport that you and I both

really love and we've been following forever.

And it has these ebbs and flows.

And sometimes you have a series like OKC Indiana.

We had San Antonio, Cleveland in 07, San Antonio versus New Jersey in 03.

There are these times when the matchup doesn't have big cities, doesn't have stars people are used to yet.

And everybody just freaks out and talks, oh my God, like the ratings for game two, I think were the lowest since the bubble.

They were the lowest for a Sunday night since 07.

Game one was bad too.

And then everybody overreacts.

A, do you care about ratings at all?

And B,

where do you think about where we're heading with the NBA these next five years from a star standpoint?

Well, I mean, I guess I

care is an interesting word.

I follow it certainly.

I'm always interested to see because they always use that as a way to sort of understand everything else.

It's sort of like the rating, we look at the ratings, and if they go up, well, then we have to look at what's happening in these games and decide that this is the future.

And if they go down, we think this is a failure.

It's not super surprising that the numbers are lower.

I would think that there's,

it,

I mean, you do get the sense that all of these pro sports outside of football are sort of moving into more sort of kind of niche identities.

Like, I don't know if this is a terrible number considering the matchup, but it really is only for people who really like basketball.

So maybe the percentage that we're seeing is an accurate depiction of how interest like what is the actual interest in professional basketball when played well by interesting teams who don't have a ton of guys who are famous.

Like, maybe this is the actual number.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I remember when I was writing my page two column in the mid-2000s, especially when it got pretty bleak there, there was like a Pistons Spurs 05 finals, and

people were worried about like the artesse melee happened.

People were worried about like basketballs too.

There weren't enough points.

It didn't seem explosive enough.

And I remember it had this running joke about how I was one of the last 20 NBA fans.

I was thinking with this finals that

it reminds me, like, you're basically pushing away the casual fans, the people who only parachute in because, oh, I know who LeBron is, or like, it's a big market, whatever.

And it reminds me of like when Pearl Jam released Spin the Black Circle and it was a way to

remind you of the Vitology record, this series.

Okay.

It pushes away.

the fans that didn't really care to begin with.

And it's like, just come here.

We want to appeal to the real fans because I think OKC versus Indiana is an awesome basketball matchup.

So do I.

I mean, the vitality thing is interesting because that was a conscious decision by the band.

It would be weird if the NBA was consciously like.

Right.

This is an unconscious decision.

Okay, we've been doing this for what, what, fucking 25 years now.

We've been having these talks.

What's the one thing that has never changed?

The NBA is always in a crisis.

It always is.

There's never been a time it hasn't been.

I think 1984 to 1987.

is the only period in my mind, in my memory, when it was like, everything is great right now.

There is no problem.

There is no percolating future.

We got to worry about, like, things are good.

This has always been the case.

I think I wrote that almost exact sentence in like a piece I did for ESPN in like 2005.

The NBA, more than any other league, is always seeming to deal with this, but you know, what if people don't like this?

Like, the problem just doesn't seem to go away.

Yeah, I'm trying to think.

So,

you know, what were the healthiest periods in the history of the NBA?

I would say the middle 80s.

That's but, you know, perhaps

late 60s, early 70s, maybe.

I think 91 and 93, Jordan's first three titles was a home run when you had the Knicks, you had the Bulls.

They were adding, they were, of course, stupidly expanding and doing that stuff, but they had so much talent.

I think that was really good.

But if that was the case, why then a few years after that, they were like, we got to move the three-point line, man.

We got to do all that.

These games are 88 to 76 in the playoffs.

That was the big thing in the 90s, right?

No one scores.

It's just bullyball, teams beating on each other.

It was like there was Jordan and then like the Knicks and all these physical teams.

The heat were like that for a while.

Jordan goes away for two years.

The raids go down.

Everyone's like, ah, no one really liked basketball.

They really only like Jordan.

Jordan comes back.

The raidings go up.

Ah, you see, people don't really like basketball.

They only like him.

It's like it didn't matter what went on.

It was always perceived as a problem.

And that seems to be unique to them because this is like,

there's just never a time when people aren't talking about whatever.

Like now it's like teams score too much, you know, that there's too much three-point shooting.

And there is, although it is preferable, I think, to games that are 81 to 70, I would say, you know.

So

from a basketball standpoint, the last time the league felt really healthy was that 08 to 2012 stretch when the Lakers were in the finals for three straight years.

They played the Celtics twice, the Dirk Nowitzki 2011 season, and then the decision, which was, I think, the most important kind of fan interest event that probably happened in the 21st century, right?

But at the same time as all this was happening,

all these NBA teams were available.

The franchise values were going down.

We were headed toward this huge lockout and this big crisis that they were having economically.

And the league felt like it was in peril, even as the basketball was good.

I remember a lot of talk about like, we, you know, there's a dress code now because we don't want, I mean, that was a little prior to 2008.

Yeah.

But stuff like that is always going on.

Like, I suppose it's just like, you know,

this is something else that we've kind of talked a lot about over the years.

It's like,

it is fascinating how the NBA sort of sustains this level of popularity mostly through non-basketball media events.

Like it's, it is very rare that the thing that most people are talking about is what's actually happening in these games.

And that's just, it's always sort of been that way.

I'm not sure exactly why it is.

It might be the fact that because there's fewer players and we can really see them and we really do get to know their personalities, it pulls away the sense that what they're doing professionally is the most important thing and what's interesting about them matters just as much.

I don't know.

I just, I feel like sometimes I feel like we do these podcasts and I'm like, did I literally say this 15 years ago?

I often feel that way.

Yeah, but what's weird about this one is that

I would think ultimately having OKC and Indiana develop as signature teams would be an awesome outcome for the NBA.

And yet it's not perceived that way at all.

Well, yeah, I mean, you're perceiving it.

I mean, there's now this.

I think I'm in the minority, though.

Well, you are

in the country.

I wouldn't say you are in the media.

I feel like there's now kind of two channels of basketball discussion.

And one has gotten kind of the side you're on is we got to watch every single game.

Like I can't talk about this unless I get the NBA ticket and watch every single game.

And I need to have opinion, you know, a pretty informed opinion on, you know,

the third best guy on the Pelicans or whatever.

And then there's the other side, which is sort of like, well,

this is entertainment.

This is kind of an entertaining league.

Kind of like

what Derek Thompson would describe.

It's like, I love the NBA, but I watch no games.

You know, there's these two sort of silos of how this works now.

And what's interesting is both sides of this media equation talk to each other and the conversations don't go well because you have one guy on one side trying to describe like why the help side defense of you know Oklahoma City is so fascinating.

And the other guy is like, well, how do we feel about Chet though as a person?

It's like it just doesn't work.

But it kind of keeps going that way.

So yeah.

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You know, I think people have struggled with OKC.

Russell and I talked about this on Sunday because there's not really storylines yet for them.

I think people struggle when there's not that like typical big picture storyline to grab onto, which is like LeBron's doing this podcast with Nash right now.

And it seems like every time he does it, something comes out of it that then moves into the cycle of how people talk about sports now.

And I don't know if that's a cycle that represents how everyone talks about sports, but it's that weird ESPN show driven.

So like recently, LeBron had this thing about how

he's basically doing the thing where he's talking about his critics, but I don't know who the critics are who says someone said he doesn't have a bag.

I mean, this is infuriating to him.

I don't know who the person is who said this.

It's probably somebody with like 80 followers, but somehow he saw it.

And that's what his, he took a great offense to that.

And then Stephen Nash kind of acted like, oh, I'm offended for you.

And yeah, it was this amorphous criticism, but it wasn't attributed to anybody.

And LeBron has 40,000 points, but people don't think he has a bag.

And that really offends him.

And I'm thinking like, LeBron has a lot of ways to score.

I think we all have appreciated that for a long time.

I mean, are there guys who have a bigger, larger bag?

I mean, yes, Kyrie Irving has a larger bag than LeBron James of things he can do with a basketball, but it's very clear which guy is better.

And it's like, somehow, it's like this, this is, it's always this thing back and forth where it's like, if somebody is great because they're physically imposing, they're insulted that people don't view them as more of a skilled craftsman.

But if someone does all skills and they're all talent, then it's like this guy isn't even that good, really.

This is fake somehow.

It's like there's, I don't know who is the person who's like, I'm happy the way I'm perceived.

Like, what NBA player is happy, maybe Mike Connolly?

I don't know.

This doesn't seem like anybody's happy with how other people view them.

Yeah, maybe they're all things.

Maybe it's true for me and you.

I don't know.

Maybe no one is pleased with how they are seen.

Well, it's like Kyrie's a good example.

Kyrie, the respect everyone has for his skills in an offensive game is actually above what his actual quality and outcome is.

I mean, if we're going to talk about this stupid term bag, he has the best one.

I think, you know, I mean, in terms of finishing by the rim, the ability to handle the ball, the ability to see the floor, the ability to pass, he's the best at that.

I think I've ever seen of any player ever, with my eyes.

But he's not one of the 50 best players I've ever seen.

You know, it's just that that skills are important.

I mean, at a basketball camp, he would kill it.

Like during the stations in the morning, Kyrie Irving would destroy everyone.

But it's not the same as being, you know, I mean, I still, I do think I'm more, I defend him more than most people.

Like, I think it was, I, I was supporting the Dallas trade when it happened.

I think, you know, but

it is a, uh,

I mean, LeBron now,

I mean, he's just, it is interesting to see how he has sort of evolved as a person.

Like, you know, and we've really seen it in a way that we don't really see with most guys because no one is that famous for that long.

But we've really seen changes in him.

Yeah, Yeah, it's almost with celebrities that have that, but not athletes, where we're with somebody for 20, almost a quarter of a century at this point.

You know, I mean, it's like it's,

it's years ago now, but it's like, remember when LeBron used to constantly chew his nails?

Remember that?

He chew his nails constantly on the sidelines.

And it was like, that's what like a little kid does in a way, you know?

And that, I mean, I'm not, that's, I'm not criticizing for doing it.

I'm just, but it's, it's really interesting, like the things that we've seen him sort of shed and add over time not as a basketball player even just as a guy you know yeah the things that he's added from an offensive standpoint like he like he can really punish people in the low post now and and he has all these different things he does down there and then i i think his step back three

which he's really been doing since the mid-2000s but now it's like one of his go-to shots But I think what probably bothers him is the Durant.

I can't believe we're talking about this.

But like people have this perception, Durant, myself included, I think Durant's the best scoring forward of all time.

LeBron has been the most successful scoring forward of all time.

But I think Durant just the ease of which he just gets to 35 points like for this,

I think the last time he didn't average 28 points a game was like 2009 or something.

But we're talking about degrees, right?

LeBron, there's a lot of brute force with him and a lot of like fast break, like just flying down where he's just a better athlete than everybody else.

there was a period when he was with the heat when the thing that lebron could do is late in the game if the team needed a basket he could just go in the paint and dunk on someone he didn't do it the whole game he only do times as good as durant is a more skilled probably offensive player definitely a more skilled offensive player than lebron he never had that the brute force piece yeah the thing where i mean he you might

you know durant can get his shot and he get a great shot and go up over him but he still has to make it you know he still has to get the shot.

There's still a chance he's going to rim out.

But when LeBron could just go to the basket and pretty much throw it, there was nothing.

You could always concede that

if Miami needed, well, at one point, Cleveland needed two points, they could just do that.

So, you know, who is the greater player?

There's no question who's the greater player, but I, yet, LeBron is still sort of offended that he's not seen as the greatest player in every context.

He kind of wants to be perceived as the greatest player in every possible way it could be gauged.

Yeah.

Yeah, he's one of the greatest scorers ever, but it probably, there's probably two other people that got mentioned against him.

And then he takes that.

I always love, I just want to know who said that he didn't have a bag because that would just be a dumb, like whoever said that on a TV show or a radio show or a podcast, like that's somebody who doesn't watch basketball.

So you're arguing against somebody who's an idiot.

No, it's somebody who watches basketball and needs to say something.

I mean, that's, that's the weird thing.

It's like these guys all got to come up with something to say all the time.

And inevitably they're going to say idiotic things because the expectation is you have to say something all the time.

Well, how do you put Shea Gilgis Alexander in a context?

As,

you know, he's somebody that just gets the 32, 34, 38 points a game.

There's a case that he's already at this point of his career as good of a scorer as Kobe Bryant ever was.

But we're not, that's like a third rail.

Nobody's allowed to go there yet because Kobe averaged 35 a game in a season and he's perceived as this, you know, like the other than Jordan, the pinnacle of two guard scores.

But I think what Shay is doing is on that level at this point.

Well, it's possible to make that argument right now.

Will that argument be able to be made in 10 years?

Okay, you've got to watch him play for 10, you know, like he might be peaking right now.

This might be his, as you would say, his apex mountain.

Maybe he's on his apex mountain right now.

But we'll see as time passes, kind of, you know, it's.

Well, that's what happened with Dwayne Wayne, right?

I mean, like, well, here's like a thing that's kind of interesting.

You know, I watch a lot of these playoff games with no volume.

Like, I'm in the room with somebody else in my family.

They're on the iPad and they're watching something narrative.

So I just watch without sound.

And

I am

continually amazed by how different the experience is to just watch a game as opposed to have someone attempt to describe it.

Like all this idea of him being a foul merchant, right?

Like when I'm watching this with no volume, to me, it seems like he gets by guys.

He's a great free throw shooter.

So he kind of, it's the contact is legitimate.

He's not like saying, he's not like pretending to get followed.

You know, so he does this, you know, and it's when I'm watching without sound, it's like, well, this is a real effective thing.

But then when I watch it with sound on, the first time it happens, even if they don't necessarily criticize him for it, they mention that other people have.

And you start talking about this thing and it seems to color everything.

I mean, like,

it does strike me that like a lot of the things that we talk about, about you know, it's simply just us reacting to what the announcers and the analysts say.

I guess not necessarily the reality of those statements, it's just that this was said, so we have to decide whether we agree with it or not.

So, when I watch him play, like, I like watching him play, I like watching Brunson play, I like all these guys who apparently now are sort of perceived as being like

an unwatchable sort of individual, like they have an unwatchable style.

I never feel that way.

I'd rather see a guy, you know, get by a dude, kind of stop, get followed, try to get an and one than just guys running in the corner and just shooting threes over and over and over again.

That to me is that is the least interesting thing.

Yeah, and that's why I really like this series because it's two teams that are doing that are zagging against where the NBA was going.

The only thing Shea does with fouls that I that I do think he's guilty of is when he drive, especially when he drives to the right, he puts his left hand out as a as a borderline stiff arm and kind of keeps it out there.

And then sometimes he'll try to lock the guy's arm or he'll just, it makes it look like he's getting fouled, but really he's the one that's sticking his arm out.

And the refs just fall for it, which I don't blame him for.

But that's it.

I feel like they're officiating in the playoffs has been much better than during the regular season.

I like the level of their letting them play.

Now, some guys, he being one, does seem to get like regular season calls.

Like they call fouls, he can draw a foul the way he would in January, where a lot of other guys can't.

Like the other guys, like they just got to live with it.

But that's always been the case, right?

Isn't there always been the assumption that, you know, the stars get the calls and he was the MVP, so he's going to get those calls.

Oh, my God.

I mean, you go back in history.

That's how it goes.

The only person who seems like he gets away with more than everybody else, and I don't understand it, is Caruso.

Like, for a fact, he is way more handsy and way more physical and just constantly, like, peppering, peppering some.

It's almost like he's doing a Muay Thai class or something.

He's just hitting guys, and they just kind of let him do it.

And they did in the Denver series, they did in the last series, and he's doing it in this series too.

And nobody else in the game gets away with it.

I don't understand that.

Okay, there were some elements of that with the whole Houston Rockets team.

And there were elements of this.

uh with like the houston cougar college team this year it's kind of like do you do you have a friend who constantly gossips about everyone?

Do you know anybody like that who's just constantly gossiping?

Okay.

That person is given more leeway to do that than other people.

You get to get used to it, right?

You're like, oh, so-and-so, the other, you always talk shit about everybody, but that's just who they are.

Or if anybody else did it, it would be like, why is this person, you know, so it's these teams like Caruso now has built in this idea that this is how he plays.

And either you're going to call foul on him on six consecutive possessions, he's going to be out of the game, or you're going to let it happen.

I think that this is a, it's to his credit in a way.

Like he has sort of socialized the ref to see him as a,

like a, sort of like a, he's at a physical disadvantage that he has to make up through grit.

And they let him do it.

I mean, it was, it's like the reverse of when they would just be like, well, for Shaq to get a foul, you have to hit him with a hammer.

Like we just are going to accept that like, you know, you have to, you, we're just going to assume that he's that big and that strong.

It's just going to be contact every time.

So a lot of things that are fouls have just gone.

And that's what I think.

I don't know.

Yeah.

shaq was like that and rob gronkowski was the other one who was like that they used to drive every patriot fan nuts he just got officiated differently because he was so big it seemed unfair that he was going against like five ten cornerbacks and stuff well i mean this is kind of i guess more of an abstract question but if you were uh you know like commissioner of the nba or whatever and you were talking to the officiating crews Would you say you got to make sure everyone's officiated the same way?

Or do you have to sort of understand that some guys are going to be officiated differently?

Because I think the natural inclination is to say the former, and yet it doesn't really work.

Like, you almost have to do the latter.

Well, so game six at Knicks Pacers was interesting in that respect.

I remember talking about it afterwards where Brunson and Halliburton were both just getting mauled, and they were just kind of they, the refs, I guess, just agreed before the game, we're just going to let this go.

Halliburton was just dribbling up the court, like on pseudo-fast breaks, and people were just shoving him and pushing him, and they just weren't calling it, but they weren't calling on brunson either i'm good with it sad i don't like the special treatment stuff yeah i i i think these games are more interesting when there's more contact so

contact so we're in this stretch where okay see a team that i i feel like

People can't get a handle on because the defense is so good.

Defense is something that's never really resonated with people in the same way, like the 2000 Ravens, you know, that

it just doesn't work as well as offense because people understand offense better.

So you have that, you have Indiana that doesn't, their star is somebody that is a guy who averages 18 points a game in the playoffs.

And people are like, he's got to step up.

It's like, this is who he is.

He averages 18 points and 10 assists a game and leads the team and makes everybody better.

He's not a

step up guy.

They're better when he's the second or third leading scorer.

Yeah.

But Sayaka is the leading scorer.

That's the best.

And he, you know, I feel, you know.

Yeah.

He's, he's a facilitator.

He's, he's exactly like what Nash was like 20 years ago.

Nash wanted to be at 20 points, 14 assists, and make everybody better.

And that's what he did.

But people seem to miss that with him.

But in general, like, I like the styles.

I think the games three and four in Indiana are going to be really good.

And yet, the series, we're going to come out of it.

And people are like, that was a failure.

The NBA is in trouble.

With this OKC, oh my God, they're going to be better two years from now than they are now.

This could be like a little mini dynasty that we have, and none of us even know how we really feel about this team.

It's almost like you need some sort of controversy, scandal,

bad blood behind the scenes, something for people to care beyond just the basketball stuff.

That's what the Lakers did so brilliantly, right?

Shaq would show up fat every season.

Kobe would get mad at Shaq.

Phil Jackson would do these veiled barbs at everybody.

It always seemed like they were teetering on a collapse and they would pull it together for the playoffs.

And people are like, this is amazing.

This is exactly what I want.

Whereas OKC is just like, we all like each other we're just gonna keep winning yeah

but it does seem like there's a basketball thing to discuss which is

I don't know it's it's so odd now you're watching a game and it's the second quarter and one team is up by 19 points but then you're in this weird situation where you're like well it's now so common for this team to for anyone to come back from that deficit like right you don't feel safe at all well yeah so do i got to keep watching and then possibly like, I mean, in game two, where it just never really changes, you know?

Yeah, but then with four minutes left, Indy's down 20.

No, Indy's down 20 with four minutes left.

And I'm like, ah, they could still do this, like, which is insane.

I was early.

What happened is I kind of lost kind of attention, but I was kind of following the score.

And at one point, it sort of tightened up a little bit, but it's just, it's a, it's a weird thing.

It's like, it's like, it's weird if the, if it's fun to have these great comes backs, but it's also strange if all leads are meaningless.

But because everyone shoots nothing but threes, if you shoot a little better than your opponent and they shoot a little under what they normally do, it becomes like a 25-point margin.

And I don't know how that can be fixed.

Well, the other thing that changed it, like the Celtics were the guiltiest of all this, where

they have a lead and then they change how they play because they slow it down and they're trying to protect it.

And that seems like that screws up a lot of stuff too.

It's interesting with

this, because I was thinking about Scotty Shefford too.

The U.S.

Open is coming this week and and he has like the best odds to win a major in a while i think he's like under he's like plus 270 or something because he's been that great i think he's won 10 majors in the last year and a half

but people think he's boring

and there's no like scotty scheffler we would never have a scotty sheffler argument i would never call you and be like hey i just wanted to talk to scotty scheffler with you for 15 minutes and you'd be like what you want to talk about scotty scheffler what is there to say um tim Duncan was like this in the kind of that 2003 to 05 range, where it was like, Yeah, Tim Duncan's really good.

And we just immediately ran out of stuff to say, I wonder if I wonder if SGA has moved in there.

But Shefford to me is the number one where he's like dominating golf now in a way that we have not seen since Tiger Woods, but people don't find him that interesting, so it's just kind of happening over here.

Yeah, that happened with Pete Samfras, I felt, for a while.

That's a good one, where, you know, where

the news just kind of becomes, oh, he won again.

And

it isn't, no one is excited that it happened.

It just kind of seems like almost that

was the inevitable outcome.

I mean, basketball has the upside that there's more guys, right?

So when you were saying that, like Time Duncan, there were many people to talk about and many things to discuss about.

Gulf, I suppose, is different, although there's more personalities in Gulf now than I can remember for a while, but I don't really follow it either.

Yeah,

it's almost like when Scotty Scheffler, what happened that thing when he got arrested for six hours?

Easily the most exciting thing that's ever happened with him.

Otherwise, he's just dusting dudes in these tournaments and people are like, holy shit.

We're going to take a break and I want to talk about franchise moots.

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All right, franchise relocations.

I was thinking about this in the context of the Sonics, a topic that I've brought up a million times that I wrote multiple columns about, that I keep bringing up on this podcast.

But I was starting to wonder about them in the context historically of most devastating franchise relocations ever, because Seattle doesn't just lose professional basketball starting in 2008 going forward.

They also lose

Durant,

Russell Westbrook, who had just been drafted by them, but they're about to leave.

Sam Presti,

who I would say has probably

been the smartest GM of the last 20 years.

And then all this stuff that happens all the way through the, they don't win a title, but then they have this rebirth around, you know, built around the Paul George trade a couple of times.

And now they have this like dynasty potentially sitting there.

And you're in Seattle going, it was already horrific that we lost our team, that we lost the 1979 Champs and this embocal cord we had to basketball and people love that team.

But now we have to watch this other team basically become a rocket ship.

And I was trying to think what, what's worse for a franchise?

The only one I can think of that's like definitively worse is the Brooklyn Dodgers

going to LA.

Like that one is like, that has to be number one.

They still, that still gets brought up all the time.

It's the weirdest thing.

And sort of like people, you know, they, you know, we still call,

you know, middle school kids playing baseball, playing Babe Ruth baseball.

It's like he's like 100 years later, we still use that term.

And the Brooklyn Dodgers thing, that still comes up whenever AT moves.

You know, when the Browns left Cleveland, I had that too.

It was like a cataclysmic deal for Cleveland.

But then they got the team back so quickly and they retained the colors and all that stuff.

And they did have to see the Ravens succeed.

But

so here's what I have.

And I don't even know if this is a rankings, but these were the eight that really jumped out to me.

Brooklyn losing the Dodgers is one.

And

I think the Giants moving to San Francisco is another one because you think of baseball back then in the, you know, in the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s.

And the three New York teams were the hub of Major League Baseball, right?

There were other teams, but it was like having those three there.

That was it.

They were the epicenter.

And then by the time we got to the 60s, there was only one team left.

They had to bring the Mets back in.

But the Giants going to San Francisco.

The Colts going to Indianapolis, especially how they left.

kind of out of nowhere.

Left in the middle of the night.

And, you know, and Baltimore baltimore had had like uh they hadn't been good for a while but they had such a deep tradition you know that was still built into the town you know unit us and all that stuff so that was a bad one you know it was a bad one but they end up they get the ravens back right so it gets a little tempered by that same thing for there was a pretty big gap between that though it was a lot of years yeah

and you know speaking of that the browns going to baltimore same thing which you could see coming you could see coming but they only don't have the browns for four years Devastating to lose them,

but only for four.

Sonics to OKC, they haven't had a basketball team since, and their basketball team that left ended up basically becoming

Facebook stock

or Amazon stock or whatever.

Like, it's it wasn't just that they left, they became multi-billionaires when they left.

Um, I think a really underrated one is the Whalers going to Carolina

because,

and I would also throw the Nordiks going to Denver and

the

Stars going to Dallas.

Well,

when I heard the North Stars were going to Dallas, like I'm not somebody who follows hockey, but I thought, like, this is, because I had sort of, when I was a kid, you know, adjacent to Minnesota, it seemed like, oddly, the two franchises that mattered the most were the Twins.

and the North Stars.

Not, you know, like football is more popular than anything.

So, of course, the Vikings maybe mattered the most.

But the Twins and the North Stars seem more reflective of the town.

Like, it was like a, because hockey's huge in Minnesota and the Twins are the twins.

So, I was, but people handled it okay.

It didn't, it didn't seem to be as devastating as I thought it was going to be, you know?

Well, and they ended up getting one back.

And then the only other one,

so Buffalo loses the Braves to the Clippers.

They move to San Diego.

They never get another NBA team.

Now, Buffalo is not a huge city, but I think if you lose your team and you never replace the team, that's probably the worst.

You know, like the Colts going to Indianapolis

was like somebody's wife just packing up and leaving in the middle of the night.

Like, that's that, that was like the biggest gut punch, probably, but they did get a team back.

I still feel like Brooklyn losing the Dodgers is the worst one, just because people have talked about that for generations.

Because in most of these situations, I get the sense that

if once we get to a generation who doesn't remember the team being there, then it's not that big of a deal anymore.

Like

you can't have this memory of this team that was never in town.

But the Brooklyn Dodgers are the exception to that.

Like people who, of course, had, I mean, there's not many people around who are like watching the Brooklyn Dodgers play and still come up.

Like, I feel like a guy, I feel like the New York mayor or something, a guy running for mayor recently made a reference to the Brooklyn dodgers leaving brookly you know leaving town or whatever that that's because part of their dna was

their dna was they hated the yankees right the yankees always beat them so you couldn't then be like okay now i'll switch to the yankees because that was their travel my dad grew up in brooklyn and was a dodgers fan as a kid and he didn't have a baseball team really for the next I don't know, 12, 13 years until he was living in Boston and started rooting for the Red Sox during the, when he was going to college and the 67 Red Red Sox kind of got him back in.

But that was, I don't know, 12 years later.

And he's just like, they, even the Mets came and they're like, fuck it.

A lot of, and some people stayed with the Dodgers.

Like my friend Hershey, his dad, even though they left, stayed with the Dodgers, which is like a really hard thing to do because you're just basically reading newspaper box scores.

And then occasionally they're on TV.

Anyway, I feel like the Sonics has moved up the ladder.

I think they've passed the Browns.

I think they've passed the Colts.

I think think you could even argue they've passed the Giants when the Giants moved to San Francisco because the Mets basically replaced the Giants in the National League.

I think a lot of the New York Giants fans jumped there.

I think it's the second worst now to lose a basketball, to lose professional basketball for 18 years.

And then, on top of it, have your team become this team that was incredibly fun to watch and had some of the best players in the league.

Like,

it's a continued gun punch and not talked about ever.

Yeah, I, I, uh,

like, would things have played out the same if the team stays in Seattle?

I guess that's a hard thing to know.

Well, hold on there.

That's so that's one of the great what-ifs of this century.

Remember, I wrote my book.

I did my what-ifs chapter?

Yeah, this is a completely different Kevin Durant conversation.

If they just stay in Seattle, they're gonna have a lot of money, right?

Because Seattle is, I think, very similar to Silicon Valley, like how the Warriors became the superpower, even though the Warriors were a mess up until the early 2010s.

Then they had all this money that came in and they just built the superpower.

They could have built it.

I just don't think Durant ever leaves.

I think he's Seattle for life.

I think he's still there.

I think he's like Kobe on the Lakers for Seattle.

I really do.

I don't think he ever leaves.

I mean, I guess it's possible.

That just happens so rarely with anybody.

And he does not.

I mean, he's kind of a wandering spirit or whatever.

He became a wandering spirit.

He stayed in OKC for nine years or eight years, right?

Sure.

yeah, yeah.

I think he eventually became a wandering spirit, but I don't know.

I don't think he leaves because I think unless him and Westbrook grew up, that would have been the only way that that blows up.

I think.

So is Gerant a journeyman?

And if so, or if not, who's the greatest NBA journeyman of all time?

Does he not classify as a journeyman?

No, he's too good to be a journeyman.

I think he's a nomad.

How many franchises has he been with?

Let's see, one, two, three, four franchises now?

About to be five.

With Five.

So you could play for five teams and not be a journeyman.

Who is the greatest journeyman then?

But journeyman means you were just bounced around like you were James Cosey.

But I have a feeling like a lot of guys you're going to bring up are going to have played for less than five teams.

When we think of, you know, classic journeymen.

What about Shaq?

Is Shaq a journeyman then?

Shaq played for Orlando, the Lakers, Phoenix, Cleveland, and the Celtics.

It's weird, I guess.

If you have a bunch of franchises right at the end, it makes it seem less journeyish you know it seems like the journey has to be along the way um i mean it there also is like a sort of pejorative meaning like you know like the journeyman all-star who have been journeyman all-stars moses malone was played for a lot of different franchises and he was great in every one uh well not at the end but for the early ones certainly moses is a good one moses i think played for like six or seven teams if you include the aba yeah but we would never classify him as a journeyman i guess you know i wouldn't journeyman Journeyman is to me means you are a role player.

Always.

Okay.

So

I would use Nomad.

Probably Robert Horry.

Okay, so he played for how many franchises?

Houston, Phoenix, Detroit, San Antonio, the Lakers.

Then he ain't a journeyman.

Because he played for a lot of franchises.

And always, you know, we was the fourth best or fifth best player in Boston.

Then he was the best player in Sacramento for a little bit.

Then he helped out and helped out the Blazers when he was there.

Portland, yeah, yeah,

and that's four teams.

Um,

that's a that's a good one.

I, Robert Horry is probably the best version of it, I would say because it was he had a thing about he was on.

I mean, all these guys go on podcasts now, he did a thing about how he should be in the hall of fame, and I was like, I agree with him.

I think he's one of the best, he's probably the best

big spot role player in the history of the league, other than maybe a couple guys who are on the 50s 60 celtics um i when i did my pyramid for my book i had him in the pyramid there's no been no career like him

so not really i think i agree

i mean he actually if i if i heard he was going in the i mean if you look at say his career and mitch ridman mitch rishman's career like who had a better career and richman's in the hall of fame and he's not um you know

well that was not to criticize mitch richman he's kind of an easy example but i mean like he was I'm not saying he wasn't a great player, but he doesn't seem like a Hall of Fame player to me.

Yeah, one of the things I had when I did the thing in my pyramid was about if you asked somebody, remember the Robert Horror game, they would say, which one?

That's when you know you've had a good career.

Like, oh, yeah, the Robert Horror game.

It's like, you mean the one in 2002?

You're talking about the one in the 05 finals.

Like, you'd have to, you when he knocked over Steve Nash, like,

which one, uh, which one would you do?

But yeah, I think Durant,

i think that's that's an unbelievable what if i think his we could be talking about him completely differently he could have like four titles we would he would be like indisputed one of the best six or seven guys

so you think if he stays with that franchise they win four titles i don't know why

yeah

i mean maybe why why would that you know what why why would that have happened

He's won now two titles when he went to the Warriors, but why would if he stays that they because I think you could make an argument they would have spent more money the first eight, nine years he was in OKC because they would have had more money because they were in a bigger market.

And like, you don't have to trade Hardin

right before he's due for some extension because you're not worried about it because whatever, you pay the luxury tax.

Are they in a position to draft Westbrook?

Are they in a position?

They had Westbrook already.

They had Durant and Westbrook.

They had all the stuff.

Westbrook was drafted by Seattle and then they moved.

Okay, Okay, so his first year was in Oklahoma City.

Okay, well,

I mean, I can't really say like that never would have happened, but I don't know why necessarily him staying in Seattle would have won them four championships.

I think maybe they had won one championship, maybe.

I could argue they were super close

from 2011 on.

And if they had operated, like, say, the Warriors.

and made some big money plays with like a bigger cap, maybe that would have been the difference.

I mean, that's a lot.

You're asking a lot now.

They got to totally operate their franchise differently.

But then if he doesn't go to Golden State, those are two available, potentially.

I'm just saying it's a thought experiment.

I think could he have won up to four titles?

Possible.

I don't know.

You know,

the thing about the move, just in sort of the general sense, is that Seattle was a, I guess, a city that I thought was one of the rare towns where basketball was the most important sport, it felt like.

I agree.

There are some cities where baseball is the

most most important sport, a whole bunch where football is, but I felt like Seattle was one where it was basketball.

So it is a bummer that they don't have a NBA team.

I mean, it seemed like there should be an NBA team because, you know, it's weird that Portland has one and Seattle doesn't.

It's just strange.

Well, they're going to have one soon.

That brings us to our next topic, which I gave you a heads up on about this international basketball league that might be happening.

Cause there's been.

There's some information popping out.

I haven't talked about it that much in my podcast.

I'm still not positive it's going to happen.

But I think in the rich guy circles, a lot of them are talking about it because a lot of them have been asked to invest in it.

And five billion they want, they feel like they need five billion for it.

So it's not right.

I don't know the exact number, but I know I have an idea of the uh the premise, which is

they basically want it to be like F1,

and it's this international league, they play less games and they go to different spots all over the world.

So they go to like Singapore, they go to to, you know, Monaco, wherever the hell it is, almost operating like F1.

And they go there and they're there for like, I don't know, 10 days and they're playing multiple games in the same spot.

And then they have all this other stuff that happens.

Like there's like concerts and it's like an event.

It's like almost like a takeover the same way F1 does it.

And you move from spot to spot and maybe it's like a 30, 35 game season.

I don't know.

And what they're telling people is that they have a couple major stars that are going to be joining that are going to be jaw dropping.

And I, it's pretty clear because Maverick Arter is running this that, or is like one of the people involved in pushing it, that he's dangling LeBron is going to be one of the people that do it.

Could it be Kevin Durant?

My guess is it's probably

older famous superstars nearing the end of their career who are just going to do where they would get a bunch of money, probably equity in the league.

And it's a financial play and you try to build something.

I guess I have a few questions, one of which is,

will people watch this?

And also, does it matter?

Because like when you saw like the Kobe China stuff, that was the first time I was like, wow, people love this shit.

Like you remember when Bob McAdoo went to Italy for like four extra years in the 80s and became like a god in Italy?

Like

maybe this is a smarter way to end your career to make more money and you're global and you hit all these different countries and you blow up your brand that way because you've kind of taken everything you could possibly can out of kind of the American NBA culture.

Um, I just don't know if the league works and what that would look like.

And so, I'm laying all this out to you.

What's your instant reaction?

Well,

I

it doesn't seem like it would work to me as an American product.

So, what I'm saying is, like, I can't imagine it being it being very interesting to

American audiences.

And I think the idea of if, like, if it was like lebron and durant and those guys at their age if they come out and they seem like shells of themselves um that would be very uh kind of disenchanting to people

if they play well it would be like well this league is a joke these guys are 40 years old and they're dominating i i think that the american appetite for sports has

kind of shifted over the last couple of decades.

I think maybe in a small role, you maybe played a role in this.

In that the sense that like that that

the, that, that the, the consumer of sports now is mostly interested in the highest possible excellence above anything else.

That, like, the idea of, of

college sports and high school sports, I feel like that is receding.

And, and I think that if you try to start a league and the level of play

seems like

like a,

two tiers below what we're used to seeing

that would fail.

I feel like they would need to go after the kind of person who loved this NBA finals, like people who are interested in international basketball.

It's a smaller audience, obviously.

It's a, you know, but I do think that there is a kind of person who loves basketball who watches the NBA and they're like, I don't like this though.

And if, and when they, but when they see international players, they seem to be excited and titillated and they love to see Joker and they love to see Luca and they love to see this style of play.

They watch, you know, Team USA or whatever and they're like, I wish this was how the league was.

I think that would be the person you need to go after if you want to succeed in America.

If the idea is that it doesn't matter if it succeeds in America, if it's like this thing where it's like these guys want to expand their brand into Taiwan and stuff like that, and we just want to have these big events, I guess, but that's a different kind of success.

I mean, to me, a successful league would mean that

it can exist on its own in America and to some degree rival the NBA.

I don't think that's the goal.

I don't, I think America, any success in America would almost be a bonus

was my guess.

Like the worldwide stuff.

So it's a little different than,

you know, Liv, I think Liv backs up your argument where people, it just hasn't resonated here because it's not all the best players.

Nobody really understands it.

It just hasn't worked,

which I think is one of the reasons why it's been, but I would argue for the golfers, it's probably really worked because they've made way more money than they ever expected to make playing golf.

They would probably run it back and do it again.

So from a basketball standpoint,

yeah.

So from a basketball standpoint, if you're just talking like, if you could make twice as much money, and I know these guys are making 50 million now, but if they could make 100 million or they make 75 million, plus they get equity in this new entity and they look like they're at the cutting edge.

I just, the history of sports says that some of these guys will bite.

You know, like even think about like the ABA and the

WFL back in the day when we were growing up.

It's always amazing to me how many people jumped.

The USFL is about as successful as you could imagine.

And that didn't work.

But I mean,

the situation you're describing, I mean, is both plausible and I think we would both agree would be bad for the sport, right?

Like this would not be good.

It would be bad.

I think it would be bad for the NBA.

to not have guys kind of aging gracefully.

I think the sport, the sport that, now, I think there might be a woman's component to this too, this idea.

That's where it gets really interesting because

the WNBA, like the players really don't make the way that that league is so over-leveraged with their finances that it's impossible to really pay the players, right?

So they make all their money off the court.

But if you could basically, if you got Caitlin Clark to be involved in something like this and you gave her some crazy amount of money and she's traveling the world and she's playing 30 games a year and has equity in the league, that becomes more interesting to me because I do think people would follow her.

I don't think any NBA player in their prime

would just pack up and go and leave.

Like, I can't see like,

maybe I should be careful because maybe one of these people would do it, but I can't imagine like Giannis being like, okay, I'm good.

I won one title.

Now I'm going to just go.

grab some cash.

It really does seem like an end of the career thing

as an idea.

i i could see it possibly with an international player if they dislike the experience of living in america for whatever reason i mean i don't know why that would be the case you would think their life but if that was the case maybe

um

but uh like wemby like could could they get wemby to be in this thing three years from now if this if this goes through who knows he's from france i i don't know how i don't know if he likes america but he seems motivated to play against the best you You would think.

Well,

that's what he expresses, right?

I mean, you can also go by what sometimes these guys live, but if he's like the fact that he's putting the effort in to express that, whereas I don't always hear that from guys.

Is it possible that a young player could do that?

I think so.

I think that would be the possibility because, you know, these guys have such long careers now

that they would be like, well, I can come back and maybe play in the NBA later.

I mean, this is like, this makes no sense in a way.

But, you know, I think a lot about like load management and these problems.

And like, these guys are just, you know, now we're in the playoffs and guys are getting hurt constantly.

And I think part of it is because it's so rare that they play hard this often.

And I was thinking, why is this?

Like, well, you know, and part of the reason is, is that there's so much incentive to have a long career now.

to play 18 years, you know, because you make so much money at the end.

The numbers only get bigger that I think a lot lot of these guys

are kind of thinking at the end when they're not even toward the middle.

They're like, I got to make sure that I have this long enough career to make the big money at the end.

Sometimes I think this would be an

if after your 12th season, your salary is capped, whatever you're making in your 12th year is your sale yearly salary going on.

So that these gotten so that that,

I don't, I think it's very strange now that used to like

a 10-year 10-year career should be a long NBA career.

And now that's sort of expected.

I think part of this is that these guys, they want to take every fourth day or day off trying to the end.

And it seems to me that if the deal was after you're, whatever you're making in your 12th year sort of becomes your standard, what you make per year going forward, even if the CBA changes, even if all these things changes, that's the number,

that there might be less of a, like, it's, it would be hard to tell a guy, it's like, well, you got to play hard now.

And if his argument is like, well, i also need to be able to play some in 10 years i i think that's it doesn't it seem strange how long these guys play now that this has become like you know chris paul what was this what this is was this 20th year 18th year what year was he in this year well they just they take way better care of themselves i think

here's here's the problem the players are co-signing the schedule Like the schedule can't change unless the players are also willing to push to change it.

And they're not willing to push to change it because if it goes to 70 games, which is where it should go, everyone would lose 12 home games.

And then everybody would lose 12, you know, I guess one sixth of their paycheck, whatever one seventh.

Everyone would lose six home games.

Right.

But you'd lose, so you, but you'd sacrifice basically one seventh or one sixth, whatever works out of your paycheck.

You'd make less money.

The league would make less money.

And that's the reason it's happened.

Adam Silver actually said this in his press conference.

He's like, we're happy at 82.

We think it's fine.

He's wrong.

And

it's terrible for for the league.

And he should want to fix it.

And he should make it a crusade to fix it.

And it should be important to him.

And he doesn't care.

But I don't think the players care either.

And this is stuff they could have bargained for that they didn't.

I'm not sure going to 70 games would change load management that much.

And a guy's attempting.

I don't think that would be enough.

I think that they would still sort of perceive themselves as being guys who need to be ready for the playoffs.

I still think they would, you know,

I think it would unquestionably make the league better.

Unquestionably.

You would have, you'd basically be playing three games a week.

And I think three games a week is doable.

And you could even make it so you play like Tuesday, Friday, Sunday, or you play, you know, Monday, Wednesday, Saturday, whatever it is, have some sort of routine.

I think it would, but all these leagues, like the NFL is going to go to 18 games.

There isn't a single person on the planet who thinks that's a good idea.

But they're going to do it because the players have to do it because their careers are three years long, four years long for the most part.

80% of them their careers are done by the time they're 27 so they don't they're gonna sign up for whatever and they're they're just never gonna cut back on games that's just not gonna happen no they'll probably do you think well they'll have 20 by the time we're in our 70s yes

they may have 20 how stupid that is

the amount of money they're dealing with the numbers are so large now i mean it is like it if you kind of look at like just say with the nfl or whatever it's like

like not just revenue but like what it costs to run a team over time like what it's just it's going so up there's there's really no way around it there's no way to

to

decrease revenue like like this the league can only get bigger they're not like you know when they say things are like too big to fail some of these leagues like too big to stop like they can only have to keep getting larger all the time well especially when they're getting giant sale prices and the guys are paying a lot this episode is brought to you by mickelo boltra cracking open a a cold one on a hot summer day is one of the best feelings, but it's even better when it feels like you earned it, like in a friendly little competition.

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What is your highly specific Cooper flag prediction?

So, you know,

how good do you think he's going to be?

I think he's going to be incredible.

He's going to be incredible.

I think he's going to be, I think he has a chance to

be somewhere in the Dunkin' KG vicinity would be his ceiling.

I think he's going to have a career like Deadlift Shrimp.

Deadlift Shrimp.

Okay.

He's going to be a very good player.

I think he's going to be a very good player for a lot of years.

You know, Shrimp, I think, was a made LNBA once.

I think he was a third team L NBA once, but a few all-star games.

But I don't know if he's, I don't see him as

a dominating player.

Like, I don't think he's going to, I don't think that, I think that he will

be the, you know, the the second best player or the on a good on a on a great on a good team or the third best player on a great team so that's why i kind of think that's the player he's going to end up being i mean i like him as a player but i don't nothing i saw to to to me not that i'm an expert or anything but made me think like he is going to be um

you know unstoppable i think he's just going to be very good and i think i think kg even though he doesn't have the same height kg has i think that's the best comparison because of his competitiveness which is what he's similar to kg He's just a maniac.

Like all the guy wants to do is win.

And like he, every single practice, every drill, he's just like KG was.

He just has to dominate everything.

And those guys usually are absolute beasts in the NBA.

That's also Tyler Hansborough was like that.

They called him a speaker.

But Tyler Hansborough wasn't that.

He didn't have the skills, right?

So I don't know.

I don't know if the competitiveness alone, I mean, that's a component that's got to be there.

I mean, how, like,

it's an interesting question.

How many, who are great athletes in any sport?

Great, elite, that you would say not very competitive, though.

Oh, I think there's better.

Who is that?

Okay, sure.

Give me the ones that jump

out of your mind.

I'm not going to because we live in an aggregation universe where I say one name and then it gets thrown out there.

You know the names.

I mean, there's guys that either had

were the crazy competitors that everybody talked about or the people that we're constantly disappointed by because it seemed like they're begrudgingly giving a shit or they were always injured or, you know, they like there was just a specific difference.

It doesn't have to be someone active now.

I'm like, I'm trying to think of

what to you is an example of somebody who is who you consider elite, you know, in the top tier, but you would say not competitive, though.

Not very.

But I think all of these guys would be competitive to a certain degree because they get to the NBA, right?

You have to have some sort of level of competitiveness to get to the absolute top level.

So you're saying you think that flags, that flags competition is like, he's like, he goes to 11.

He's more competitive than the people he plays.

I think that's the thing we're 100% positive of.

But I also feel like he's an elite, elite, elite defender.

He's already like an elite passer.

He's just additive in everything he does.

Everything he does makes other guys better at all times, right?

So it's a little similar to how, even though they're completely different, but like Haliburn is just additive.

Everything he does is just helps other guys I think he's like that too but it's more in like the KG side and that was what made KG so great like KG was like defensive anchor didn't care if he scored um almost like scored begrudgingly there's a there's a flag offensive piece where he he can potentially be a little tatum-y like you might be able to run him as your point forward he's not as skilled of a scorer as tatum was but he might you might be able to run the offense through him at the top but then have him be your best defensive player and i think that would be the ceiling like a little kg little tatum i'm not saying he's going to get there but i think that's the ceiling he's got physical great physical attributes really competitive what makes him different than say than russell westbrook

a great physical specimen who's extremely competitive and works extremely hard well i think that was a that was a big success for russell westbrook right the athleticism and the competitiveness I think what's different with Flag

would you how elite do you classify Westbrook you like to say which like in when you're ranking guys where will you rank him of players of the 21st century where do you rank him i mean he's probably one of the best 50 players ever okay

but if you were top 50 okay i'm just curious yeah it seems like mostly 50 i it's i feel like you talk bad about him much more than you talk positively about him that you see you see his flaws as more defining of him than his positive attributes well i think the issue with westbrook if you're going to look at him and you're comparing him against the greatest players of all time

the guys I had the issue with, there's like the situation has to be perfect for them.

And there's like a lack of malleability.

It's like, you know, when he put up his biggest stats in OKC, it was like he had the ball all the time.

He did everything.

And that was great for him.

It wasn't necessarily awesome for the team.

You just had a limited ceiling with that.

And I always thought there was a push and pull with Durant in some ways.

I always like the guys that I feel like can fit into any basketball situation.

Kobe was the most interesting out of all these guys because Kobe always wanted wanted the situation to be the best for him.

But a lot of times that was the right situation for the team.

You know?

And that's

he was, you know, he was because he was so talented.

Most talented player on the floor almost at all times.

I mean, even, even though he was with Shaq, of course, he's got, you know, Shaq matters more for physical reasons, but like he's still the most skilled player.

Kobe.

Shaq's a really good example for this question you're asking me.

Oh, I was wondering if you were going to mention him.

Yes.

Did he, was he not competitive enough to you?

So Shaq's one of the 15 best players ever.

I thought he was awesome.

If Shaq was wired like KG was, I'm not sure what happens to the NBA for that entire time.

Now, he probably doesn't play as long.

But if he was just like, I want to destroy everybody every game and this is all I care about,

I do think that was another level he could have gone to.

I remember writing that Shaq was like the guy who went to college and graduated with a 3-7 and had a great time, but probably could have gotten a 4-0 if he really wanted wanted to.

KG was the guy who graduated with the 4-0.

You know, KG maximized every single ounce of whatever his career could have been.

And I think Cooper Flag's going to be like that.

I think Duncan was like that too, by the way.

The same thing.

Duncan was basically playing on a bum leg for the second half of his career, but Duncan was another one.

He was just steady.

He was always there.

He was completely additive.

He made everybody better.

He was an awesome teammate.

He didn't care about his points.

Like, Flag's not going to care what his box score is.

That became understood over time, though.

I don't think, I mean, I think the initial thing with Duncan, just because of his demeanor, was, is he engaged enough?

Is he interested enough?

Like, just too passive.

And then, yes, too passive, you know?

And then that completely switched.

And no one thinks that now, you know.

Well, the Duncan part is.

Duncan is definitely a people forget because as the years pass, some guys live on in different ways and other guys.

We just don't talk about as much.

But, like, Duncan annihilated the 99 finals.

He was clearly the best guy in the playoffs that year.

03.

He had some really good battles with the Lakers.

I think, so we disagree.

I think Flag's going to be better than you.

What did you think about the rehearsal?

I think he's going to be good, but I don't, yeah, I don't think he's going to be.

I don't know if I, if I, if he will ever, I, I, I'm predicting right now, he will never win an MVP award.

He will never win, he will never be named leaky MVP.

I think I would take the bet.

Okay, okay.

You know, there was something unsports-related that I wanted to ask you about, though, which is kind of a weird thing, but I'm just curious.

We're not talking about the rehearsal.

Well, we can talk about that, sure.

Well,

you like the rehearsal, yeah.

You wanted to talk about it.

I was excited to talk about the rehearsal.

Yeah, okay, let's do it.

Yeah, um,

why did you like it?

Well, you know, the whole thing with Nathan Fielder has always been like,

what part of this is real and what part of this is fake?

Like, if there's like more than anybody else, he kind of pushes this boundary between what we're actually seeing and what is orchestrated.

And I would not have thought he could have leveled that up.

But this last season of the rehearsal,

I've never seen something where I am so unclear about what parts are real and what parts are fake.

I have no sense of it.

It could be 98% real.

It could be 4% real.

And, you know, so he's really funny.

He finds ways to be funny in situations that you wouldn't normally see that.

But there's also like

an appreciation for the execution of what he's doing.

It just, it seems like he's working differently than everybody else who does this, you know, and a lot differently.

Not like he's taken something other people have done and sort of, you know, twisted it or morphed it.

Like he's doing something that I don't, I don't even know what the analogy is.

The thing about the rehearsal that's so interesting, and maybe you've experienced this, have you ever tried to describe it to someone who's never heard of it?

You will sound like a fucking crazy person, like trying to describe what you're watching

to somebody who doesn't know what it is.

It just sounds you hear yourself saying things that make it seem like you're on LSD.

Yeah,

yeah.

So, for the people listening to this who didn't see the rehearsal,

let's do that.

I'll do the exercise right now.

Um,

the season starts out with Nathan Fielder being obsessed with pilot communication

and a theory that plane crashes happen partly because the pilot and the co-pilot don't spend enough time trying to connect as partners the same way you would in like basketball or other things.

And goes on this deep dive to try to prove his point, starts rehearsing pilot interactions.

goes backwards, recreates the Sully plane crash.

And

it's all leading leading toward you think he's going to actually just have two of these pilots that he basically rehearses together.

So they have chemistry, fly some sort of crazy mission.

And then the twist is he's been taking pilot lessons the whole time, and he's going to fly a 737 with this guy that he's handpicked throughout a couple episodes.

And they're going to fly a 737 together.

So the season finale is all of a sudden he's a licensed commercial jet pilot.

Did I describe that correctly?

I mean, yes, everything you said is true, but even like, I don't even think that goes far enough.

First of all, what I always tell people, if they've never seen this, is I do feel you need to watch the first two episodes of the first season.

You don't necessarily have to watch the whole season, but you definitely need to watch the first two episodes because he is basing everything off the premise that everything in life would be easier if you could rehearse every day-to-day moment of your life through the highest highest possible simulation,

which is like, and when you say that to someone, they're like, well, what does that mean?

I'd be like, well, are you going to have lunch today at a diner?

Would it be easier if we built a diner that you could then go into and talk to an actor who will pretend to be the waiter?

Like, it's like, well, how does that make sense?

Well, in some strange way, it does because it's sort of he's tapping into this idea of

what parts of life are real and what parts of life are unreal.

And, you know, like you can do an argument with anybody about anything.

What's, you know, big picture stuff.

What will they often say?

Oh,

that thing you're describing or the thing you're promoting, that thing you believe in, that's just a construct, right?

They'll be like, that's a construct.

That's not real.

And what his sort of theory of entertainment is, is that it's almost all a construct.

Everything that we do is a construct and the fact that it's constructed doesn't make it less authentic.

So then he's a comedian who decides, is it possible that a comedian could have real change in the world in a good way, despite the fact that people can't take him seriously because he's always joking?

That's how the season begins.

Then the season moves into this idea that he's obsessed with plane crashes, seemingly for real, particularly black box recordings, and has come to the conclusion that the real issue is that pilots and co-pilots do not have enough interpersonal interaction.

Maybe it would be better if we made them do a play before every flight where they discussed their freedom of knowledge and their willingness to hear other things.

And he's flying a 737 for real filled with actors, which he couldn't do if they were just people.

But because he's paying them as actors, he can fly these people in the same way it's illegal to pay someone to have sex with you unless you film it and it becomes pornography.

I feel like that idea is brought into it.

There's also the aspect in this show at the very end where he's kind of like, well,

I got to go back into this.

There's also a point in this show where he deals with the possibility, the accusation that he has autism and his belief that he does not.

And that in fact, his autistic qualities are

human nature, that everyone thinks about this just like him.

And then at the end, when he flies the plane, he's like, well, okay.

So if you're autistic, they wouldn't let you fly this plane.

So because I managed to get into a situation where I can fly the plane, that proves I'm not autistic.

I really think, and I haven't, maybe this has been written about in a thousand places.

I think this season was like an homage to Catch 22.

The book Catch 22, are you familiar with that?

Yeah, it's sort of like in Catch 22, the whole idea is that there are these fighter pilots, and

the belief is that you can only be a fighter pilot if you're kind of insane.

So, to prove that you can't be a fighter pilot,

you can't do it by becoming crazy because that validates your ability.

It's like where the phrase catch 22 comes from, right?

And I think that that's what tied into this.

If you listen to the end of that, that last episode, he's basically saying the fact that he flew this plane full of actors.

when he wasn't qualified is proof that he was qualified.

And that's a real complicated idea when you really think about it.

Yeah.

and then the last piece of that would be this is why we have

plane accidents every once in a while because we do not put any real thought into who gets to be a pilot and who gets not to be a pilot it just comes down to how many hours you flew well and and also it was amazing to realize you can become a 737 pilot without actually flying the plane you can just just put the hours in and you could somehow get there and you have to take a test and be like no i'm not autistic and all the other things that he points out but the other thing that's like so he becomes a real pilot right and and we see all this footage of him learning this so when did he start this did he start this before

yeah he started he so he started first rehearsal like how many years has he been doing this apparently at least two

um where he started taking lessons and stuff because uh that was in some of the some of the writing about the series after it finished where they were talking about apparently there was a reddit thing where people realized that he was taking pilot lessons.

And there was this theory that the last episode was going to be him flying because they had seen the, because you can track all this stuff.

So I think it had been like two years.

There's also an interesting aspect that he does something that you don't normally see on television shows.

He starts talking about problems he had making a different TV show, The Curse, for a different network.

Right.

And how it was removed from streaming services because it was seen as being, I can't, anti-Semitic.

It was an episode they removed because it was anti-Semitic, allegedly.

So then he, well, but it was, it was, it was considered anti-Semitic because there was just like, I guess, length, like, I don't, I don't, it seems to be opposite.

So then he simulates him going to talk to a guy in Germany, which he imagines to be in the city.

You know, then the guy who was simulating the German then says, like, this is now it is.

Like, there's, there are things that happen.

in every one of these episodes that i i'm almost like i i i there's no comparison to this and anything i've seen before and i don't know how i feel about it like like he there are uh he he does seem to be a rare thing which is a completely amoral canadian

like he seems to have he doesn't seem to have like like he

you know and and i i guess it's and you know like like in

in some ways i guess i sort of relate to this he'll be talking about ideas and you can sense that the question around that idea is, should you even be doing this?

Like, should you be having, you know, another aspect of this show, he creates a false singing competition, like a, like a, you know, like the voice or whatever, except the people judging the singers are all airline pilots.

Because he needs to teach the airline pilots how to give constructive criticism.

Like, they did all these weird things.

It's like, so he's manipulating all most of the people involved in this are kind of, I think, being willfully manipulated.

Like, they gotta know something is going on and they want to be involved, anyways.

Um, it is

there's just,

I mean, I, I, I, I, I seem like I'm just like, maybe being too rhapsodic about this, but I really do think, like, I, if somebody said to me, it's like, boy, I want, I want to see something that's really good and really interesting and

not what I've seen before, like, this is it.

Like, I, I, I, I, I'm trying to think of what TV show prior to this.

And, you know, when he did the curse, that was a narrative show that also did things I had not really seen in television before.

I mean, his, his level of innovation and true creativity is just kind of off the scale.

And, you know, it's like, there's a lot of people who know the form of creativity.

They do creative things because they know what people will anticipate and will see as creative.

He is not like that.

Like the things he is doing, he is doing for the first time.

Well, it makes me think of how people, and I was a kid, I remember Andy Kaufman, some of the stuff he would do and how people would talk about it.

And it got to the point when he died, people were convinced that he faked his own death.

And that was like his big grand thing.

So I'm sure Nathan's been influenced by him

a little bit, just how people perceived him.

But

the way he took this last season.

I thought the first season of the rehearsal was amazing.

And it was just like, I've never seen anything like this.

This last season went a whole other level beyond that.

The first season clearly did get fucked up by the pandemic.

I feel like that they had to do, like, there were some things that would have happened in that season that just became impossible.

Cause I feel like it was shot during the heart of that, like when it was really hard to do anything.

The Andy Kaufman thing, yes, I'm sure in a way, but what's, you know, like I happened to just watch a, like, I've seen a bunch of Andy Kaufman documentaries.

There's one I saw just recently on Canopy or whatever.

And the thing that

about him, though, that was like

there was a degree, in my opinion, of real kind of self-indulgence to what Andy Kaufman was doing in the sense that it really wasn't for anyone but himself, which as an artist, all people do, but I'm just, I'm not even saying this is a huge criticism.

There was something where it was like

the only person.

who could be amused by this is himself or someone watching it years later and realizing that, like, this is crazy that this happened.

With Nathan Fielder, it is a little different because

I find his motives and his intentions more confusing.

Like, I don't,

I can't necessarily say he's doing this just to please himself.

I do think there's a possibility that he actually does think that he can stop airline crashes.

And he was like, but the only way I can do this is by using my my platform as a comedian.

So I have to first convince people that,

you know,

that a comedian should be taking.

I don't even know.

I like, I don't even know how to describe it.

Well, you, you left out one other piece, too, is that he loves when anything gets uncomfortable.

It's like his

all-time sweet spot.

So on top of all this big picture stuff that he's doing and all these big themes he's hitting, just fundamentally, the best part of his show, it seems like for him, is when it can get super awkward with somebody.

Like when he's asking that pilot who, you know, obviously didn't have a lot of luck with the ladies and the guy's giving him information.

And you could just see like something shifts with him where he's, it just becomes the most interesting conversation he's ever had.

I know, yeah, it's like what you're saying is true because it's like this.

It's like a guy who's blind has an advantage in darkness, right?

Yeah.

A guy who's uncomfortable all the time has the advantage when everything else becomes uncomfortable.

So the more, the stranger the situation, because his personality never changes.

Like his, he remains the same for the totality of everything he does.

It doesn't matter if he's doing something boring.

And there are stretches on the show that are boring.

There will be a five or 10 minute stretch when it's like, I wonder if this is going to be a bad episode.

And then a lot of times it'll come back at the end.

So like discomfort is where he is most comfortable.

Well, it'd be great if he was

like he'd be the greatest NBA sideline reporter of all time.

Like, come back, let's go to Nathan Fielder.

He's with Rick Carlisle and he just completely makes Rick Carlisle uncomfortable.

I did, I think I did the first podcast with him when I was at Grantland

or one of the first ones.

And trying to interview him was like trying to,

I don't know,

ride a bull or something, you know, and he's, he both knew it was a good thing to do the podcast.

I think he liked me,

but

he's just his default is he likes when it's uncomfortable, right?

So it's a podcast and we're talking and he's a little uncomfortable anyway.

And it was just the weirder the podcast get, you could just see like the twinkle in his eye every time something would happen.

I was like, oh, this is the, those are the most fun people to interview.

Well,

sort of, it's also kind of an impossible interview in a sense, because why do people go on, like, why do people listen to celebrities on podcasts why do people read new yorker profiles of people or you know rolling stone profiles of people they're like who is this person for real okay and he doesn't do that no he's never gonna do that right

so when he is on your podcast that is the same as when he's on his show i don't think that there is um like a

I can't imagine a scenario.

Like, I think if

I interviewed him, I think it would be a disaster because my whole thing is always whenever I interviewed people is like, well, I want to try to get something from this person that

will kind of show sort of a reality about them that you can't get through their art, that this is who they actually are.

And this is the thing that they do.

And I have no idea how I would do that with him.

I have no idea what I would ask him or talk to him to convince him that

what I'm trying to find out is what is behind the thing he's ostensibly doing, because what's behind the things he's ostensibly doing is ostensibly the same.

I did a thing, you know, those for your consideration where they show the episode to a bunch of Emmy people, like they'll go, they'll rent out a theater and they show it and then they interview the person after.

Okay.

So I did that with him a couple years ago for, I think it was the first season of the rehearsal.

We showed the episode and you know, all these people there and he just, he's just not going to do that typically, right?

So his whole thing was to make it uncomfortable.

We brought the guy out who was the, one of the stars from the first season.

And that guy came out and it was just, he just wanted it to be as awkward as possible.

And it was like perfect.

It was exactly what you would have thought would have happened.

I just think that's how he's wired.

I thought, Nathan, for you, the Comedy Central show he did, I thought he really started to figure that show out, especially the last season.

and took a lot of those kind of breadcrumbs from that show and just moved them into this.

Now it's like, I don't even know what I want him to do for the next season.

I got to imagine HBO is thrilled.

It's like the perfect HBO show.

It's so fucking weird.

It's so great.

It's like such genius.

You know what?

You, we should interview.

Interview the guy who greenlit this and ask him, what the fuck did he tell you in your office to do this?

I'm serious because the budget for this is insane.

Like

in this season, when he goes out and has to buy a 737 and he's actually looking for like a bargain 737 and going, like going to these actual places, like I can't imagine how this, if I can't describe it to someone who I'm trying to convince to watch it, how do you describe it to someone to pay for it?

I just have no idea.

What would be your number one draft pick for the next rehearsal season for him to dive into?

Well, I mean, this is a real lame answer, but like, I want him to just do what he does.

I want him to just follow what he's doing.

Like, cause there's no way, there's no way I could have predicted this.

Like, there's nothing, like, there's no way I could have advised him to do this.

I just, I think that what he, he is after something.

He is after some idea.

I mean, maybe I'm giving him too much credit.

I don't know.

I don't think he

feel like he is after something that, I mean,

in some ways, might spend my whole life.

This question is like, what is real?

Like, what parts of existence are real?

I mean, you wrote a book about this once.

Well,

they're all about that.

They're all about that in a way.

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There's something else I want to ask you about, though, that's not related to this, but I just, I feel like you'll have an interesting response.

So,

so, you know, it was, it was hot.

It's 90 degrees here in Portland.

So it's Portland said, let school out.

Okay, we can't have school.

It's 90 degrees.

So after you got something, you got nothing to do with my kids home or whatever.

So we watched Cool Hand Luke, you know, which I've watched probably 10 times in my life or 15 times in my life.

One of my favorite movies, you know.

Okay.

So that movie's made in 1967.

And

I've also been a couple songs that I've been listening to a lot lately lately: is the song Jailbreak by A.

Jailbreak, which I had 76 or 77, Escape from Alcatraz, I think it was like 1979-ish, maybe 1980 or whatever.

So, there was this period of time when there was a lot of art about the idea of breaking out of jail, right?

Yeah.

And there are still people who break out of jail.

There was like guys who broke out of jail recently in New Orleans, and one guy immediately makes a TikTok of himself out of jail or whatever.

I saw that, I was reading about this guy in Arkansas, a former cop who broke out of jail.

He got caught like a day and a half later.

And what I was thinking about is, so prior to the internet and prior to like network computing,

if you broke out of jail, could you just

never get caught and go into society?

And is that completely impossible now?

If someone broke out of jail now, could they ever in any way

sort of become just like a citizen?

Because you know, in the past, if there was like, if you got out of jail in georgia and you got to kansas or whatever well how would they unless you were like just a murderer that the entire country was looking for if you were just like somebody who was arrested for cutting the heads off of you know uh uh uh

meters or whatever it's like there would be no how would they even know you're there how would they like you know you used to be able to get an apartment you didn't even need id i think on my first apartment i got in 1994 i don't think i showed them my id i think i just wrote my number down

What do you do now if someone escapes from, if you escaped from prison, what would you do?

Incredible questions.

And I followed the New Orleans thing very closely.

It was my kind of story.

Yeah.

There was even,

there was betting odds about which guy, just based on the mug shots, which guy was going to make it the longest.

And I think the consensus when people looked at the pictures, that guy actually did make it the longest.

But

so I think the heyday for this would have been the 70s.

I think when Bundy broke out of the Colorado jail and was somehow able to make it cross-country, that was the heyday for a lot of bad behavior.

Because we didn't have any cameras.

He could just kind of move around and nobody could ever find you.

I think the cameras would make it really hard now.

And facial recognition.

It just feels like there's cameras every year, facial recognition cameras, like the moment, like those New Orleans guys, they move out of there

and you're either going,

I guess the goal would be to go to mexico right you want to get out of america right i mean

yeah it would be hard with like to get into canon out would be pretty hard but even if you i mean

so you're so if you like let's if you just escape you go to a different city but your name is in the FBI database.

You are an escaped prisoner.

Your mugshot can be called up anywhere.

If you get pulled over by a state trooper, I mean, it's very possible that he could

so what so you can't get pulled over anywhere you're basically better off

i mean do you want like the terrible answer what's the terrible answer you're probably better off finding somebody's house that has a super old person living by themselves

and probably have to commit another crime take over that house and you have about two weeks there to like get to really plan out whatever you're situating

assuming Assuming the person you eliminate has no kids.

I mean, I guess if it's genuine, I mean, you're in good shape because kids don't talk.

But if it's like an, like, if someone had taken over, my parents are dead now, but if someone had taken over my mom's house, like, that would have, that would have been deduced very quickly.

That, like, probably, no, so maybe of like three, four days, right?

Before people are like, yeah, I called dad and nobody answered.

And now I'm starting to get worried.

It's been four days.

So maybe if four days.

Let's say it works.

Let's say you find the old person.

And my point is, i don't think you can be in the streets for the week i think you have to find some sort of a roof where you can kind of plan what your next thing is you probably need a car maybe you need to like switch the license plates and i think you want to go toward a place that doesn't have a lot of people So maybe you want to go like Middle America.

You want to go like Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota.

Like that should be your ultimate goal is once I get there, now I can, there's less people.

I can kind of move around.

Maybe I find some new house that I could, I could, you know, maybe I could scout a house and doesn't seem like a lot of action.

Maybe it's somebody's winter house that they don't even use

and just kind of bounce around.

You're going to get caught eventually, though, is the point.

But that's the thing.

You would say that it is virtually impossible for someone to escape from jail or prison and completely just disappear now.

I think you get caught within a year.

I don't think there's any way to not get caught unless you left the country and went.

once you go down.

I think once you go to Mexico, that area, I think maybe a better chance.

Right.

Wouldn't the move be what should your move be?

You didn't tell me.

Well,

I'm here killing old people and you're not even saying it.

I mean,

I would think that

the thing you would need to do is

to

find a sympathetic second person,

either someone you could convince to start dating you, you know and live to live with or oh right to be like your your co-conspirator well somebody who can be like i can get you food i can go out and do these things for you you know but at some point you're going to have to try to integrate back into society and i i wonder with now with network computing if that's kind of like you know people go off the grid but let's you can escape the you know you can you could escape from all that i guess and and you know but then it's like do you want to escape from prison to live in ted kaczynski's cabin you know you if you're getting out of prison you know it's it's what's like in that acdc song this thing is like i'm not spending my life here i'm not living alone it's like he wants to find someone to be with so you would your desire would be to get back to the world but can the world no longer be can you can you no longer re-enter the world as a different person Well, you're talking with people that probably have committed major crimes and aren't dealing with a full deck to begin with.

But I think it's a good point about meeting somebody on the outside.

So maybe if you escape, you have to know somebody's waiting on the other end that now be your accomplice.

That's why

Escape from Dana Mora was such a good show because it was like, fundamentally, they had good ideas, right?

They had the prison guard.

They were going to go.

They knew their route.

They were going in like a pretty unpopulated place and be able to go and try to get to Canada.

And then it went haywire.

But even then, they almost made it.

you know they were out there for days and days nobody could find them so i think that when you go to like those more remote places you probably have a better chance as long as it's not cold like too

there's so much like you know songs and films and tv shows from like the 60s and 70s about breaking out of jail i just gave a bunch of examples of it like uh

were there lots of escaped prisoners in America in the 40s and 50s.

Like some guy breaks that, you know, gets off of chain gang.

You know, I'm a fugitive from a chain gang or whatever, but there's no,

like,

when I say like there's no paper trail, it's because paper would have been the only possible trail.

A piece of paper saying that you got sent to jail.

That's like, what else is there?

Like, there, you know, there's, they, they can't send your photograph or your mugshot or a watching poster to every post office in the United States.

It was like, it seems like in the past,

there would have been a real sort of incentive to try to break out of jail.

It might work.

It could work well, but I don't think it's possible possible.

Well, how do you watch Shawshank now, knowing all the current technology?

Because Shawshank, think about like he escapes that prison, I think, was in Maine in the movie.

And he's got to go from Maine to Texas and then cross the border to get to Mexico.

And in 2025, he's just getting caught within.

I don't know.

First of all, he's not pulling off really any of the stuff he pulled.

He's not going to 12 banks and taking out all the money.

They just would have caught him almost immediately, right?

This would have been a huge manhunt

in 1968, whatever, maybe easier to do.

I haven't seen that movie since it came out.

What is he accused of?

I can't remember.

Well, he's falsely accused of murder.

He's accused of murdering his wife, but he didn't do it.

Oh, really?

Well, that's real crime, then, I guess.

They might be interested in that.

Yeah,

I just sort of remember him kind of working out kind of a pretty good life in prison.

You know, he was like helping guys, seem popular, didn't seem to, you know, worked with him.

He had to get out.

They killed his favorite guy.

He ended up in Mexico.

Yeah, I don't think that you're not getting on the bus now.

Like,

I just think they would catch you.

So, so you think in our lifetime,

will somebody escape from prison and never be seen again?

I mean, I don't know.

Like from this moment forward.

Well,

I mean, I think that

since everything happens now, something that could happen, I guess, somehow, but it it seems just impossible to me like i don't know how it would be done in the united states maybe they would be able to track their google usage like they'd have all kinds of tricks but even if they can't catch you it's like you have to re-enter the world and it's like that's the hard thing it's like you like you uh um it would be very difficult to live a quiet life that doesn't require you to like show your id for something show your your driver's license your passport or something like like you, to get a, to even get, like, a,

I mean, I think there used to be would have been possible.

Maybe you go somewhere and it's like, there's day laborers.

They pay you in cash.

You can get a job.

Right.

You know, I don't think there's anything like that now.

Well, now they have a real ID for flying.

Like you, it's even harder to just fly compared to 30 years ago.

You just hop on a plane.

Well,

somebody could have given you a ticket.

It'd be like, yeah, here's my plane.

Yeah, I have to go to the DMV and like wait four hours to get that or whatever.

I don't know.

It seems just like my normal ID, except there's a scar on it now or something.

We have to wrap up.

Do you have any generalized AI fears before we go?

Well, many, many AI fears.

You know,

I can't think of many other examples of something where almost everybody who understands it seems to believe it could have incredibly catastrophic.

like outcomes and yet we just keep going on it.

I mean, even like the atomic age and the nuclear age and stuff, it was like we're doing this against our will.

Like, if Russia wasn't doing this, but like everybody, everybody seems to understand.

Like, um, a guy for the Times, uh, Ross Dothart, Duthart, Duthart, I don't remember saying his name, he has this podcast.

He, uh, and he did a kind of interesting podcast with this guy who like used to work in AI and is now sort of like the ultimate like doom and gloom dude.

It was kind of interesting, uh, and not implausible, except for one aspect to me.

Like, he's working on a timeline that says, like, this is is going to happen in 2027 or 2028.

Like a complete reinvention of society in the next within two or three years.

There's part of me that's like that can't be.

There's no way that can, you know, but like,

I

don't know.

I'm not, I'm worried about it.

I mean, I, are you, what I, do you, do you have concerns about this?

Yeah, I'm worried about it.

I think it's just, it's almost going to be, you're going to have to develop two parts of your brain.

One that is able to interpret that somebody has done something with AI and made a fake thing seem real.

And then the other part that realizes what's real.

I was thinking about this.

My dad the other day, he sent me this, uh,

sent me this clip.

It was a Tibbs press conference.

You know how sometimes they'll do these press conferences and they'll change the wording.

And somebody had mailed it to him and he saw it and he was like, I can't believe Tibbs said all this stuff in the press conference.

It's crazy.

Like he thought it was real.

And it was just him saying crazy shit in a press conference.

And it like hooked my dad.

And he thought it was real.

And I was like, that was AI.

And he's like, ah,

I got to figure out like, like, this is so hard.

I'm going to be 78 in November.

I'm going to have to spend the rest of my life figuring out what's real and what's not real.

And I'm like, yeah, I think that's actually what's going to happen.

Well,

okay, I think it's true, but I got to say, What you're describing, very low on the list of my things I'm worried about.

Right, right.

You're talking about This is the

war games would be the highest.

Okay.

Did you see that show?

That I did.

Okay.

And like, I thought they did a pretty good job of creating a scenario of how someone in this position could kind of create this sort of, you know, global chaos or whatever.

So, but

I don't think like the fact that they make up these interviews and all that stuff, and it's going to be hard for us to know as consumers if this is a real thing or that's that's bad, of course.

But

i i

is it the bigger fear that it is going to basically eliminate

every

interesting job and the only jobs that will remain are the physical blue you're going there yeah i was thinking like because what i the reason i used my dad example was because that made me think and mountain head's a good example of that too that if you can tweak stuff and make people think something's real when it's not

to me that's terrifying terrifying because eventually we can start doing that with presidents saying things they didn't say

all that stuff yeah when you're talking about like like deep what's going to happen to society no i mean and this is what i'm saying this timeline they're talking about they're not talking about like this is something that's going to happen in 20 years they're talking about these things happening in two years

um because the thing that ai can do and this is like i don't know it's so obvious it's just that kind of done like the thing that it can do is

millions of simulations every second.

So like, okay, so you can't grow lemon trees in North Dakota, right?

So you ask some of these AIs, like, you know, how could we grow lemon trees in a climate that's not hospitable, you know, it's inhospitable.

And it will just work through every possibility until it finally concludes, well, what about these seven things?

You know, say,

so it's going to do that with everything, right?

Any situation, like there's, there are a lot of situations where people go like, well,

we won't be able to do this thing, like this thing we'll need, you know, but it will just simulate ways that can be done until it comes up with one.

And

I don't.

But what did you say?

There's going to be benefits.

I'm just devil's advocating.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

There's going to be benefits with medicine and health and, you know, dieting and all these things that are probably going to help us.

So the best case scenario is that that creates this sort of abundance utopia where AI does everything so well and so effectively and so quickly that we don't have to work.

And that you don't like, you know, and that we like,

it will

revolutionize farming in a way that food will be so cheap, it doesn't matter if you don't have a job.

And it will be able to change all, you know, it will be able to figure out ways to, you know, construct homes so cheaply that like

that's the best case scenario.

But no one seems to really think that the best case scenario is the most likely outcome.

What it seems more likely is that it's going to just completely separate society into

a fraction of the populace who controls everything because they control the AI technology.

And everybody else will really have like no role at all.

Like there'll be nothing like

even there won't even really be a creative role.

because it's going to, I mean, it's pretty crazy.

Like you can put, like, I put some text that I had written into chat GPT to see what, like, I said, like, edit this and tell me what you think, you know.

And

like,

one of the things it said is this is very much in the vein of Chuck Klosterman.

Like, it was pretty wild.

Like, you know, yeah,

I mean, it's, it's pretty crazy.

Like, you know, I was like, wow, you know, it's like, I didn't know how to feel about that, to be totally honest.

I think that, like,

unless we are

wrong about this, but it doesn't seem like we, it seems like we under, like, like that, that

this is going to be

far more transformative than anyone wants.

And yet, we still keep pursuing it.

There seems to be no attempt at all to slow the idea or to even question what's going to happen when these things start to manifest themselves in the way that we speculate is very possible.

possible.

So the last time this happened since we've been alive was the internet in the mid-90s.

When everyone was telling us that it, no, I know it's no comparison, but when everyone was telling us in the moment,

this is going to change everything.

And we're like, is it?

And they were like, no, no, watch.

It's going to change everything.

Really?

And then it slowly changed everything.

And the AI thing is basically super speeding that.

But it's going to change every aspect of life.

But remember, even in 97, the concept of paying for something online, we were so terrified.

Yes.

Somebody's going to steal all my stuff.

We didn't want to give it our credit cards.

Like you're, because somehow it seemed different than like giving someone your credit card number over the phone and they were writing it down.

It wasn't like the idea that it was sort of in this kind of interconnected system.

Even the movies from that back then, like the net and disclosure was like, oh, it's all, all the stuff that's out there.

It's going to, it's going to take our, take our identities and our lives.

So I do wonder if there's some of that panic with this, but I also agree with you because I think about a lot with my kids.

Like, you know, my kids, my kids are 20 and 17.

And it's like, what are they, what is life going to be like for them in their early 30s?

Well, no, is it just going to be everything AI?

Are they going to have jobs in the same way?

I have no idea.

So, you know, a few years ago, this book, Sapiens, came out.

And I thought it was really great.

Now I realize many people have huge issues with it for all these different reasons, but I thought it was really engaging and really interesting.

The author is this Israeli guy, I believe.

And I saw an interview with him.

And now he brought up something that I thought is a pretty kind of fascinating point.

He said that this is maybe the first time, the period we're now like, everyone always thinks that we're like living in this totally unique period.

And a lot of times it proves to be false.

But in this way, it might be.

He's like, throughout any

other period of time, if you had a kid who was five, you had some sense of things that they needed to know by the time they turned 25.

You know, if it's, if you're, it's, if it's the 1500s, it was like, you got to learn how to ride a horse.

Like you have to, you have to learn how to like uh to like you know make rice you need to do all the you know for us when we were young it's like we're gonna learn how to drive right you're gonna have to drive in 20 years um you're gonna know how to read need to know how to read all these things this is the first time where we really have no idea what will be necessary or essential to people 20 years from now it is very possible they will not need to know how to drive it is increasingly possible they will not need to know how to read i mean these like these fundamental things

are completely now kind of up for grabs in a way that is kind of unique to the experience of what's happening with computers right now.

I don't, and that someone's going to be listening to this and they're going to be like, ah, no, that's not true.

What about this?

You know, let's talk about the Industrial Revolution and all these things.

And I understand that.

But there is something bizarre about how unclear the immediate future now sees.

Like how, how, how, how no one knows what it's going to be like in 100 years, but I have a sense that we don't know what America is going to be like in five years.

And that's weird.

I mean, that's a weird thing.

Well, and the other thing is all the rich people that buy businesses or try to build businesses or expand businesses and invest in all of these different things and technologies, all of them are just in on AI right now.

And that's it.

And it's like this big battleground because All those people seem to feel like this is going to determine the future of the next 20 years period.

This is what we have to worry about.

We need a plan for this, which makes me nervous.

Yeah, and I also, it's like,

you know, because when we talk about these things, always the first idea is like, well, it's going to hurt poor people first.

It's going to hurt, you know, sort of marginalized people first, you know, and that's usually how these things work.

But this is a little different in that I feel like it could completely reinvent

the meaning of the economy, what the economy is, what money means.

That

there are people right now who are pretty wealthy and pretty secure, who could find themselves much closer to the bottom 2%

than the top 2% in a short amount of time.

That

wealth is going to be kind of sandwiched in the degree to which the difference between having $4 million and $40,000 is much less different than it is currently because the meaning of money will change.

And I mean, these are sort of like, and, you know, when you kind of look at like kind of like metrics that we were used to sort of thinking about, like the idea of inflation, that like every 20 years, things double in price.

Or if you look back 20 years, what you could buy for $20, you now need $40 for.

I don't know if those things are going to continue.

Like these things that we kind of, these kind of loose understandings we have of how money works,

things seem to be escalating in in a way that makes me know, it's kind of strange running this podcast in this kind of dark way, but I am worried about this and I don't know what can be done.

Well, it does seem like the first time everything's on the table in a long time with culture and life and everything.

Like you could tell me AI is going to figure out a way to make all of this food that will be just as

edible and healthy as anything else.

And it's going to be way cheaper and food will become much, much, much cheaper in all of these different ways.

I'd believe it.

It's almost, that would almost be like a podcast.

What would you not believe about what's going to happen the next 15 years?

I would believe just about any outcome with AI.

Could we have CNA anchors that are just AI anchors?

Maybe.

I don't know.

Even the best case scenario is weird.

Like, let's say in the best case scenario, AI makes it so that essentially no one has to work.

That robots do all the manual physical things.

AI makes all the decisions and creates everything.

Like,

what do we as humans do?

Like, what does life become if there is no physical work and no creative work?

Like, it seems very, well, okay, and you're kind of buddies with Ben Affleck.

So

I don't often say this, but like Ben Affleck said something that I was, I thought it was pretty smart, kind of.

Like, I was surprised.

He was talking, someone asked him about this and he was like, well, it's not going to affect like the highest echelon of creative people like it won't affect actors directors and such but it'll affect everything below it like there's certain things that people will just they will crave humanity in and they will not accept you know a digitized actor and you know but every all the jobs below it will be gone sort of and he said like well you know when in the movie industry at one point we lost all this money when this when dvds disappeared because that was like a second release of the movie and you kind of make the money back and that's the reason there's no middle middle class in filmmaking now is because we don't have that kind of that second boost.

But he's like, what if it's in the future?

It's like, say you watch, you watch all of succession and then you have the option to pay, say, $200

and AI will make you.

one version of succession just for you, one episode of succession, where you can say what you want to have happen in it.

You know, it will have all the actors.

A career or an adventure succession.

So that'll be like the bonus thing if you're fair, you know.

And I was like, well, that'd be kind of a cool thing.

I wouldn't like the idea of all television being this way but it would be neat if you could say like what if this happened and this happened you know and that you know and to me that's kind of a good case scenario but my thing is this i think that as time moves on

somebody like my kids or maybe even your kids will not

see much difference between AI created content and actual content.

Well, especially music.

I think music will be the first way that goes.

But there'll be some sort of Taylor Swift that's just all AI that becomes popular and people are like, I don't care if it's not real.

I like it.

Well, I mean, it's interesting to think about it, like how it was like in podcasting, right?

Like,

what if it was possible to take every podcast you've ever done?

I think it's possible now.

And then kind of create a new pod.

Like, you would just kind of constantly create these ideas from like old ideas, you know?

I'm sure it's going to happen.

Yeah.

We're about to be replaced.

Yeah.

Well,

it could be.

And then I guess we're supposed to somehow kind of be also that really kind of plays into this idea that like

nothing new will be created.

I mean, like, I know every time I do any of these things, I am talking about like the slow cancellation of the future because I'm just obsessed with this idea.

I think it's the most important idea that I've come across in the last 20 years.

But like, it does seem to me that the likelihood of new ideas being kind of put into the cultural bloodstream is just going to disappear.

And that we're just, and the content we have now, pretty much, is going to be the content in perpetuity, just sort of repackaged.

Well, the question is, in 20 years with where we're going with AI, would Nathan Fielder's last rehearsal season even exist?

Because nobody, AI could never think of that.

Yes, that's true.

So I guess some might say, well, that's proof that it'll never happen.

That will, that, that, that, they'll, that there's no way,

uh, like, what was it?

What was the Gavica tagline?

There's no for the human spirit i think those are things yeah like that there's certain things that we'll just never be able to do although then whenever you talk to anybody who knows about ai they're like i don't know i don't know what's like like once

once we

because you know if you think about ai as a child right think of it as a child okay when does a child become self-aware of itself like three or four or five right yeah but are they aware of themselves or are they being socialized to to understand that they're a self and they're something?

You know, is it possible that while AI computers will never become wholly self-aware,

they will adopt all the qualities we associate with self-awareness and it will essentially be indistinguishable.

Like they will still, they will still be unable to actually cognitively come up with an idea that wasn't someone else's.

But there's a lot of people like that too.

There's a lot of people who can't come up with any idea they haven't heard from somebody else.

Let's say two years from now,

AI figures out how to make

another Nirvana album.

It takes all the Nirvana songs possible, and the technology is so good that it could be like, this is actually the album if Kurt Doesn't Die in 94.

This is the album we think they would have made in 95.

And they released an album and it's got songs and lyrics and actually feels like it could have been the Nirvana album.

Would you listen to it?

Well, I would definitely listen to it.

The question is.

What if you listen to it?

Like, okay, this is like a real kind of fucking bullshit answer, but like, I would listen to it.

The question is, what would I hear?

And it would actually force me to confront something that maybe I can't confront, which is that when I'm hearing popular music, am I really listening to the music?

Or am I also injecting everything I know about the individual who made it?

and the history of music and what I like about music and what I am like and who I am as a person and what I think rock means and what all these things into the thing and then hearing it back.

And if it comes from from AI, will I be like, the only thing is the sonics.

So the music, you know, and

there are certainly artists who I already enjoy in that way, that

I have no relationship with the, I don't even know the person necessarily.

If I listen to classical music, for example, if I hear some classical music that I like, there's a high likelihood I don't even know who made it, right?

I know nothing about, don't know what, can't, not only do I not know what year it came out, I might not be able to even say like what century it is from, right?

So that I'm only I'm only appreciating that just for the sound, right?

Does that work with a band like Nirvana?

Probably not, because pop music, rock music, hip-hop, all of these things are not exclusively sonic experiences.

Yeah.

They are an outgrowth of a culture that we associate with youth and that we associate with all these other things.

And that, you know, so it might be,

you know, impossible to

like, maybe the highest compliment you'd be able to give in the example you describe is like, I can't believe how much this seems like nirvana.

I can't believe how close this is.

So it'd almost be like a plant-based burger.

Yes.

You're like, wow, this really tastes like a cheeseburger.

But I also know it's not a cheeseburger.

Although in that case, in that case, you could say like, well, this is great now.

I'm going to eat this plant.

They've made this plant-based cheeseburger that I I can't tell the difference.

It must be healthier than eating meat.

It's going to eliminate our need for cattle.

It's going to, you know, the amount of methane they're supposedly putting out, but also the idea that it's somehow cruel to slaughter them and all these things.

There's no, that doesn't happen with, like, we wouldn't get to the new Nirvana and be like, oh, this is great.

It's like, now I don't got to worry about the singer killing himself.

Like, that's not going to happen, you know?

Like, the fact that Kurt Cobain killed himself has an impact on how Nirvana sounds.

And I know that sounds crazy, but it does for most people.

And I guarantee you, if you play Nirvana to somebody who has no idea who Kurt Cobain is compared to someone who does, the appreciation of that music is going to be slightly shifted

because it is impossible to not know the things that we know.

I feel the same way about Millie Vanilli.

You know, they had a couple of good songs, but now you can't unsee the fact that there was the lip syncing.

I don't know where this goes.

It makes me super nervous.

And now you've made me uneasy for the rest of the day.

And we have to go.

I did my job.

You have two books coming out in 2026, which you know.

Strange.

So,

so yeah, I have two books coming out next year, which, because I haven't had them just for a variety of reasons.

I have a book coming out in January,

which I'm going to send you an.

You'll be on before January.

So

it's a book about the meaning of football you know it's just called football it's like walter camp's 1896 book football okay um and i think that you will agree with 50 of it okay i think 30 you will strongly disagree with and 20 you will be like this doesn't seem like it's about football but that was coming out in january i would have loved to have it come out before this football season starts because there's always a chance that something's going to happen in football that's going to change the meaning of this book but i don't think so and then i have another book coming out next fall

uh which

the reason i have two books coming out is because i had to have this come out in a different publisher because my my

publisher rejected this book they were like it's too weird uh but i want it to come out so it's going to come out yeah

i can't wait

um a pleasure as always great to see you chuck hostman you bet thanks

all right that's it for the podcast Thanks to Chuck.

Thanks to Gahal and Eduardo for producing.

As always, you can watch this on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel.

You can watch this video podcast on Spotify.

You can go check out the rewatchables.

We did Working Girl, as I mentioned earlier.

And by the way, programming note: I am going to be doing another podcast after game three of the NBA Finals

on this podcast.

Not going live, but we'll have it up as soon as possible right after the game,

me and Zach Lowe.

So stay tuned for that.

I will see you late, late, late Wednesday.

I don't have

a feelings with them.

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